A recent Washington Post editorial tells the story of Domingo, a 13-year-old Salvadoran who lives with his mother in a refugee camp just outside San Salvador. Until two years ago, Domingo and his family were part of a Christian base community. Then their village was attacked by ORDEN, the supposedly outlawed right-wing Salvadoran paramilitary organization. His father and three brothers were murdered. Domingo bears gruesome scars from the attack: huge, crudely stitched welts across his face, neck, and arms made by a machete that nearly dismembered him. Asked whether he is angry at what happened to him when he was just 11 years old, Domingo pauses for a while and then says, barely audibly, "Yes." Philippe Bourgois, a U.S. graduate student recently returned from El Salvador, recounts his escape with a thousand peasants from a Salvadoran government attack. For days they zigzagged across fields, hiding day and night behind boulders and trees to escape helicopter strafing that came 10 to 12 times a day.
He saw a young boy blown in half by a grenade. And he helped hold the legs of another while shrapnel was removed from his body, stuffing a rag in the boy's mouth so his screams would not alert the government troops.
Workers with Salvadoran refugees in Honduras speak of a condition common among the children, which they have named "persecution delirium." Its symptoms are a constant feeling of fear, accompanied by long periods of crying and inability to relax or concentrate.
In El Salvador an entire generation--those who survive--are growing up haunted by the ghost of terror. Even those who have escaped personal physical torment have witnessed the rape of their mothers, torture of their fathers, murder of their sisters and brothers at the end of a bayonet or from a helicopter's indiscriminate fire.
While the U.S. government continues its search in El Salvador for specters of communism that have yet to be documented, it ignores one very real ghost whose existence is proven in the lives of El Salvador's terrorized children.
The language of "going to the source" of terrorism in Central America is common around Washington. The phrase implies cutting a trail from San Salvador through Managua to Havana, and then finally to Moscow. But the truth is that a search for the source of Central America's brutality eventually takes us home, to the doorsteps of the White House, the Capitol, the Department of State, and the Pentagon.
The pattern of repression in Central America follows the Argentine model. It begins with "decapitation," or killing off the leaders (heads) of the opposition political parties and popular organizations. The second stage involves destroying all suspected guerrillas and their sympathizers. The third is an escalation to keeping the whole population terrorized by mass slaughter of civilians; in Guatemala, officials refer to this as "drying up the sea" which always holds the potential for producing or hiding guerrillas.
Movement toward the third stage has been greatly facilitated by U.S. military aid and equipment. Eyewitnesses of peasant massacres in El Salvador, such as the Rio Sumpul and the Rio Lempa crossings in which more than a thousand refugees were slaughtered, talk about the presence of U.S. Huey helicopters, first developed for counter-insurgency in Vietnam (see box on page 16). Ten of these helicopters were first sent to El Salvador as part of a "non-lethal" military aid package. Several have also found their way to Guatemala (see accompanying testimony).
The presence of U.S. advisers has made repression more sophisticated. Marianella Garcia, president of the El Salvador Human Rights Commission, stated the following:
Since January [1981] and the arrival of U.S. advisers we have seen qualitative changes in the repression. Before that when we found corpses they had the signs of one or two kinds of torture, but now there are multiple tortures on the same body. It horrifies me to talk about this, but now you have corpses without hands, with multiple burns, sexual torture. Frequently we find corpses with two cuts exactly on the carotid artery in the neck. There has also been an increase in the use of chemicals such as a kind of gas that is like a spray that burns the flesh down to the skeleton, and there has been an increase in the selective repression of women and children.
Bourgois saw a victim of acid spraying, a middle-aged woman "whose skin was bubbling off," left on a village path as a warning to other villagers. He also learned that among the 1,200 to 1,500 government soldiers who attacked him and the peasants were members of the elite Atlcatl battalion, which was trained by U.S. military advisers. Many of the architects of this training and of U.S. policy toward Central America played a major part in shaping the U.S. role in Vietnam.
For months the major U.S. media kept a lid on the atrocities being carried out with U.S. support. But the cry of the suffering people of Central America could not be suppressed forever. Nor could it be buried in the Reagan administration's torrents of anti-communist rhetoric. Innocent civilians are being slaughtered by the thousands, and the U.S. public is taking notice.
Beyond the terror so vicious as to have finally spilled onto our newspapers' front pages and the networks' nightly news are more frightening plans being hatched behind closed doors. In December of 1980, under pressure from the U.S., El Salvador and Honduras ended a decade of formal hostility by signing a peace treaty. Hailed here as an important stride toward peace throughout the region, it was actually the beginning of a regional collaboration against the people of Central America. Almost a year later, Guatemala was added to the configuration when officials from the armies of the three countries met to form a "Northern Triangle" defense alliance. Its purpose is "to prevent a communist takeover of Central America."
A week later, in November of last year, military commanders and intelligence officials from 20 Latin American nations met privately in Washington with U.S. officials. The "Conference of American Armies," at which U.S. Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and Salvador an Defense Minister Jose Guillermo Garcia were the keynote speakers, gathered to discuss "countering terrorism, subversion, and armed insurrection" throughout Latin America.
Also last fall, U.N. Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick toured South America and consulted with the military regimes of Argentina, Uruguay, and Chile--known to be among the hemisphere's worst human rights violators--about increasing their military involvement in Central America. And as recently as February of this year, the Reagan administration was quietly encouraging a political alliance between Honduras, Costa Rica, and El Salvador to support Reagan's increasingly unpopular policy in the region.
These quiet alliances occasionally exploded into visibility in the Caribbean. In early October last year a series of joint military training operations between U.S. and Honduran forces, called "Eagle's View," took place near Nicaragua's coast. The same month a giant military exercise directed by the Pentagon, named "Expedition Oceanica '81," brought together navies of South America in the largest display of personnel, warships, and aircraft in the Caribbean since World War II.
Early this year plans were being laid for the first major naval exercise by NATO forces in the Gulf of Mexico, between the U.S. mainland and Cuba. The exercise, called "Safe Pass," is designed to insure safe passage of supplies and personnel should there be a "wartime emergency." Also in the works are classified discussions with a number of Latin American countries for increasing U.S. military bases for use in a regional emergency. And on December 1 of last year a "U.S. Forces Caribbean Command" was established by the Pentagon at Key West, Florida.
The Reagan administration continues to maintain that it has no plans to send U.S. troops to Central America "at the moment"--a move that would certainly meet broad opposition in this country. But whether or not the president sends in troops, he has already declared war on the people of Central America. The effect has been devastating in terms of human loss, and the suffering will only increase as our government lays the groundwork for an escalating war.
Although the countries of Central America are different in character, two overriding realities are shared by the four nations most embroiled in the spreading conflagration: 1) long histories of rule by elite minorities who have enforced their rule by massive exploitation and repression and 2) victimization by U.S. hegemony over the region's resources. The specific tragedies that have unfolded are outlined below for El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua.
El Salvador
A U.S. visitor in El Salvador reports that a common morning greeting in the country is, "I'm happy you've lived to see another day." These words carry no small meaning in a nation that witnessed between 12,000 and 17,000 deaths last year and experiences mounting murders every day.
The U.S. government continues to pump aid to El Salvador's ruling junta, which claims to be moderate and intent on reform. But the agrarian reform, hailed here as a step toward justice in a country where a two per cent elite controls 60 per cent of the land, is carried out with the most grotesque repression.
In response to the severe poverty and violence of the people's situation, a growing opposition has arisen and appears to be gaining strength. In January the rebels attacked the Ilopango air base and incapacitated U.S.-supplied Huey helicopters. In response President Reagan dipped into a "discretionary fund" beyond congressional control and immediately sent $55 million more military aid. The aid package included six new helicopters as well as, for the first time, troop transports and attack planes.
The sending of the emergency aid was particularly brash because last September the U.S. Senate, growing uneasy about Reagan's policy, put restrictions on military aid, contingent on Reagan's certification of progress on human rights and investigation of the murders of the four U.S. churchwomen slain in December, 1980. Although five National Guardsmen have been singled out, evidence suggests that the murders involved the collaboration, if not the direct order, of high-ranking officials in the government and army. Reagan's pronouncement of human rights progress has been strongly countered by both the United Nations and Amnesty International.
Proposed military aid for next fiscal year is $60 million. However, Defense Minister Garcia is asking for future aid and equipment to crush the opposition that could total half a billion dollars. With a desire to double the Salvadoran armed forces, Salvadoran vice president and commander in chief, General Jaime Abdul Gutierrez, said, "The amount of aid we've received is still insignificant."
In addition to aid, 50 U.S. Green Berets are in El Salvador. And almost 500 Salvadoran officers are receiving training at Fort Benning, Georgia, and 1,000 soldiers at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
Elections for a constituent assembly in El Salvador, scheduled for March 28--between the time of this writing and its publication--are surrounded with controversy. The opposition, aware of a history of fraud and military control, and the fact that members of its leadership have been assassinated, has refused to participate in the election, since it is certain that any candidate it might put forward would be murdered. Garcia has said, "Elections will be carried out, even amidst flying bullets, and then the subversives will have to face the decision freely made by the Salvadoran people."
The Reagan administration stands virtually alone with the Salvadoran government in its support of elections rather than negotiations between the government of President Jose Napoleon Duarte and the opposition. Voices from the United Nations, including many U.S. NATO allies, as well as from the U.S. Congress and the church, have emphasized that elections cannot be fair until negotiations or other steps toward resolution of the conflict are made.
Mexico has offered itself as a mediator in the negotiations. On relatively friendly terms with the U.S., Salvadoran, and Nicaraguan governments, and also aware of the legitimacy of the opposition movement as a voice of the people of El Salvador, Mexico is in an ideal position for such a role. Despite persistent refusal in the past of such an offer, perhaps the Reagan administration might now show some openness to a negotiated settlement.
Guatemala
Guatemala has suffered a long, dark history of repression. Its most recent and brutal chapter was initiated by the U.S. in 1954, when a CIA-engineered coup installed a ruthless military dictatorship.
While El Salvador has received most of the attention, the violence in Guatemala is equal to that of its neighbor; some say worse. Some estimates say that 13,500 assassinations were carried out by the government in 1981. Unlike El Salvador, which claims to have a moderate government unable to control extreme military elements, the work of Guatemalan death squads has been supervised by outgoing President Romeo Lucas Garcia himself. The church has been among those heavily persecuted for its work with the poor.
Despite the ideological stakes the U.S. has in El Salvador, Guatemala holds far more strategic interest. Almost 200 U.S.-based multinational corporations have investments there, and Guatemala's oil fields, an extension of Mexico's, are said to hold the potential for the third highest production in Latin America.
Guatemalan national elections took place on March 7. Three days later, some votes were still outstanding, and the results still unclear. However, the official government candidate and former defense minister, General Angel Anibal Guevara, had announced himself early on as victor, with only a fraction of the votes in. The other three candidates, claiming fraud, were detained by armed riot police. With none of the candidates getting a clear majority, the congress had to choose between the top two, and Guevara was officially named as president.
The claims and confusion surrounding the electoral process undermine Lucas Garcia's promise that the elections would be "pure, free, and clean." The Reagan administration, which has had difficulty proposing aid to Guatemala because of its blatant and massive human rights violations, encouraged the elections and hoped they would help clean up the country's image.
What remains clear amid the confusion is that the military maintains its stranglehold on the country. The Guatemalan experience should cast even graver doubts on the Reagan administration's backing of elections for El Salvador.
Guatemala's gross human rights violations caused the Carter administration to cut off military aid in 1977. Last June Reagan overturned that decision and sidestepped congressional review by reclassifying four categories of military equipment. The result was the sale of $3.2 million worth of military vehicles to Guatemala.
As the Guatemalan government's repression has increased and its torture grown more barbaric, its opposition has solidified. Four major opposition groups representing labor, students, peasants, journalists, and professionals joined together in February to form a united front against the government.
Guatemala's Indians, who constitute more than half of the population, have suffered widespread kidnapping of their youth to force them into the government's army. That the deeply peaceful Indians have recently, in desperation, begun to join the opposition is a sign of how cruel conditions have become.
Honduras
Were it not for Haiti, Honduras would be the poorest country in the Western hemisphere. A U.S. visitor to the country commented to a Honduran official, "I understand your economy is near bankruptcy." The official replied, "There is no economy in Honduras."
In November of last year, the Honduran people voted in their first presidential election in 18 years to end military rule. The new Liberal Party president, Roberto Suazo Cordova, a conservative who inherits the severe economic crisis, knows that his survival depends on friendly ties with the Honduran military and the U.S. government. As one Mexican magazine put it, "The Liberal triumph remains mortgaged to its military and the U.S."
Since the demise of Nicaragua's dictator Somoza, many in the United States are looking to Honduras, which shares major borders with the three other countries, to be the new policing agent of the region. Sources indicate that Honduras is one country being considered for a new U.S. military base. Honduras has provided refuge for exiled members of Somoza's National Guard, who have carried out raids across the border into Nicaragua. The U.S. military is currently engaged in two operations in Honduras which are setting the stage for a CIA-financed Latin American paramilitary force. This force's home will be in the border area, and its purpose will be to overthrow Nicaragua's revolutionary Sandinista government.
Honduras' Salvadoran border is receiving exiles of a different sort-refugees from its war-torn neighbor. More than 50,000 are believed to be in Honduras. Beginning last November, the Salvadoran refugees were uprooted from their border camps and forced to relocate inland at great emotional and physical cost. The move from the border coincided with an increased military presence in the camps, including armed raids on the refugees. Many believe the exodus is making way for a free-fire zone at the border, the objective of which is to trap the Salvadoran rebels between Honduran and Salvadoran troops.
Relatively free in the past from the violent repression that has engulfed its neighbors, Honduras is showing the first signs of a move toward such brutality. Beginning late last year, a number of "disappearances" of members of the opposition were reported.
The Reagan administration has plans to make Honduras the third largest recipient of U.S. military aid in Latin America this year. The $10.7 million figure is double last year's amount. The 1981 and 1982 total will equal more than half of all military aid sent to Honduras in the previous 30 years.
Nicaragua
In July of 1979, the Sandinista National Liberation Front overthrew dictator Anastasio Somoza, ending a brutal 45-year dynasty. The revolutionary government inherited a devastated economy and a $1.5 billion national debt. Although beset with continuing economic difficulties and political divisions, the revolutionary government has been able to reduce illiteracy from 50 per cent to 12 per cent, and redistribute 12 per cent of the national wealth from the richest to the poorest sectors of the population.
The greatest threat to Nicaragua is external. Exiled members of Somoza's National Guard are preparing in Honduras for a counterrevolution. Their threat is aggrandized by U.S. support.
While Secretary of State Alexander Haig Jr. continually bellows about "overwhelming and irrefutable evidence" of Nicaraguan and Cuban arms support for El Salvador's rebels (of which not one credible shred has been produced), as many as 800 pro-Somoza exiles in south Florida and a hundred in California are receiving insurgency training at armed camps for an overthrow of the Nicaraguan government.
The existence of the training camps is one of the most blatant examples of hypocrisy in the Reagan administration's policy.
Several voices have contended that the camps violate the Neutrality Act of 1794, but Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs Thomas Enders has stated that the exiles are not breaking the law "as long as they don't hurt anybody and as long as they don't actually conspire to invade in a specific way." Enders should take note that on January 15, at a meeting in Miami of more than 100 exiled leaders, Fernando Aguerro, a former Nicaraguan senator who lives in comfortable exile in an exclusive Miami Beach condominium, gave a war cry that was echoed and received with deafening applause.
The Sandinista's understandable fears of attack are further compounded by President Reagan's apparent authorization of covert actions against them. The plans include a $19 million, CIA-funded program to build up a paramilitary force of 500 Latin Americans that will be based along Nicaragua's Honduran border. Receiving particular encouragement to participate in such a force is Argentina, a human rights violator of the worst degree.
Haig's frantic search for evidence that Nicaragua, with Cuba's support, trains and arms the Salvadoran guerrillas has led to an entertaining array of embarrassing predicaments for the Secretary of State. Last December the first administration "white paper" on the subject was so riddled with inaccuracies and falsehood that it was completely discredited by the media. In February the discovery of a Nicaraguan "military man" in El Salvador was hailed by Haig as proof of Nicaraguan intervention. Evidence seems to suggest that the man was a student at a Mexican university traveling home for semester break.
The most embarrassing incident yet came last month. After days of pronouncements that Haig had just the right indisputable card up his sleeve and was waiting for the right moment to play it, he trotted out a 19-year-old Nicaraguan guerrilla. Giving his testimony before the State Department and the press, Orlando Jose Tardencillas Espinosa stated that earlier confessions he had made in El Salvador about his guerrilla activity were made under torture and threat of death.
As he recanted his earlier statements and denounced the U.S.-backed Salvadoran government as "criminal" and "fascist," State Department officials sat in shocked silence. Asked by reporters whether he was now under U.S. or Salvadoran control, Tardencillas replied, "As far as I am concerned, they are one and the same thing." Lest any in this country still wanted to believe Haig's accusations, this latest fiasco did much to destroy the man's credibility once and for all.
It should come as no surprise that the Nicaraguans, who themselves suffered under decades of brutal repression, are sympathetic with the struggle of the people of El Salvador. But the Nicaraguans consistently deny the arms shipments of which Haig accuses them. The Salvadoran rebels themselves, and U.S. eyewitnesses, have stated that most of their arms are captured from the Salvadoran government forces or bought on the international market.
It is not hard to understand why Nicaragua feels a need to build up its defenses. Reagan's policy, which began last year with a cut-off of aid, grew to an exchange of virulent rhetoric that Mexican President Jose Lopez Portillo called "verbal terrorism," and has finally escalated to direct attempts to destabilize Nicaragua's government.
In response the Nicaraguan government has taken some disconcerting action, including recent imposition of a state of emergency. Understandably fearful of its future, the Nicaraguan government appears to be turning some of its apprehension against its own people. It would be a tragedy if the Nicaraguan people's revolution, a hopeful turn from the vicious dictatorships that preceded and surround it, were undermined from without by U.S. aggression or from within by its own fear.
Assistant Secretary Enders, who helped plan and then supervised the secret bombings of Cambodia in 1973 and later was involved in a cover-up of casualties, said of the resistance in Central America: "If, after Nicaragua, El Salvador is captured by a violent minority, who in Central America would not live in fear?"
The situation he projects is the present reality. What are the current ruling regimes if not violent minorities? The prospects of finding a person in Central America who does not live in fear is as likely as our Secretary of State finding evidence of massive Soviet infiltration.
Alexander Haig has accused the U.S. press and public of a "myopic preoccupation" with Central America's internal problems. But it is he and his colleagues who look at the region with a blindness that sees only an arena for East-West confrontation and military solutions.
The narrowness and absurdity of the administration's policy were driven home in a conversation between Jeane Kirkpatrick and a Costa Rican official. In response to Costa Rica's growing economic crisis, Kirkpatrick offered military aid to the country. The official pointed out that Costa Rica has no army. The tragedy of such a policy is all too clear in Central America. Its shortsightedness is pushing people to desperation and promoting what it is intent on destroying: a strong opposition. That the people are rising up should be no surprise to anyone who understands their situation.
The surprise would be if the Domingos of El Salvador and the other countries of Central America grow up without bitterness. What seems almost incredible is that forgiveness flows in the midst of such violence. But that too should be no surprise to those who understand the connection between suffering and faith.
Joyce Hollyday was associate editor of Sojourners when this article appeared.
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